Verizon, ATandT, Others Sign On for PLAN Federal Alert Texts

Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile and Sprint have all agreed to support PLAN, a service that will push out federal and local location-based alerts in the event of an emergency.

The same day that the collection of consumer location data
was called into question by a Senate panel, FCC officials and executives from the nation's top
wireless carriers unveiled a new program that will enable federal agencies to
alert citizens via text messages of impending dangers.
Federal Communications Chairman Julius Genachowski, with New
York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and executives from the nation's top four carriers, on May
10 introduced PLAN (Personal Localized Alerting Network), a new
location-aware plan to alert consumers via
their mobile devices. The free service will
send customers with enabled mobile devices geographically targeted, text-like
messages alerting them to an imminent threat.

"PLAN ensures that emergency alerts will not get
stalled by user congestion, which can happen with standard mobile voice and
texting services," the FCC said in a May 10 statement. "Authorized
government officials can send messages, which participating wireless providers
then push using their cell towers to enabled mobile devices in a targeted
geographic area."

Bloomberg called it a "quantum leap forward in using
technology to help keep people safe."

PLAN will send out three types of messages, of 90 characters
of fewer: Alerts from the President; alerts
involving an imminent threat to life; and AMBER Alerts (America's Missing:
Broadcast Emergency Response) regarding a missing child.
W. Craig Fugate, administrator of FEMA (Federal Management Agency),
said that the recent tornadoes in the Southeast emphasized the need to quickly
convey life-saving information to the public.

"This new technology could become a lifeline for
millions of Americans and is another tool that will strengthen our nation's
resilience against all hazards," Fugate said in the statement.
While the FCC was announcing
PLAN, in Washington, D.C., executives from Google and Apple were questioned by a Senate subcommittee
regarding their practices of collecting and storing the location data of
consumers with Apple iPhones running the latest operating system and many
Android-running devices.

In his written testimony, Alan Davidson, Google's director
of public policy, explained the growing importance that society today places on
location-aware technology-from helping someone locate the nearest coffee
shop to driving directions-which over the last few weeks has had
something of a nefarious shadow cast over it. Davidson submitted:

Existing emergency notifications like AMBER alerts
can be improved using location data. In crisis situations, people are
increasingly turning to the Internet on mobile or desktop devices to find
information. Within a few hours of the Japan earthquake, for example, we saw a
massive spike in search queries originating from Hawaii related to "tsunami."
We placed a location-based alert on the Google homepage for tsunami alerts in
the Pacific and ran similar promotions across News, Maps, and other services.
In cases like the Japanese tsunami or the recent tornadoes in the U.S., a
targeted mobile alert from a provider like Google or from a public enhanced 911
service may help increase citizens' chances of getting out of harm's way.

In 2006, Congress passed the WARN
(Warning, Alert and Response Network) Act, requiring the carriers that
chose to participate in PLAN to activate the technology by April 2012.
AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile and Verizon will activate the service in New York
two quarters ahead of schedule, said the FCC statement. By the end of 2011, 90
percent of New Yorkers with PLAN-capable mobile devices will be able to receive
the alerts.
"Given the kinds of threats made against New York City
at the World Trade Center, Times Square and other places popular with visitors
and tourists," Bloomberg said in the statement, "we'll be even safer
when authorities can broadcast warnings to everyone in a geographic area
regardless of where they came from or bought their phone."

Michelle Maisto has been covering the enterprise mobility space for a decade, beginning with Knowledge Management, Field Force Automation and eCRM, and most recently as the editor-in-chief of Mobile Enterprise magazine. She earned an MFA in nonfiction writing from Columbia University, and in her spare time obsesses about food. Her first book, The Gastronomy of Marriage, if forthcoming from Random House in September 2009.